


Home in the Hills

by Anonymous



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Parent-Child Relationship, Sober Gamzee Makara, Universe Alteration
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-08
Updated: 2019-05-08
Packaged: 2020-02-28 09:57:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18754102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: With a few changes in circumstances, Gamzee and his lusus are closer, and are a more ordinary custodian and charge. This does not quite solve the problem of Gamzee eating things he shouldn't.





	Home in the Hills

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a prompt: "can't cook, send help". A Gamzee & Goat fix-it. I think it counts as fix-it. If not, self-indulgence.

* * *

  
_Home is the sailor from the sea,_  
_The hunter from the hill._  
\- AE Housman

 

*

 

Gamzee Makara has never once tried to eat his bedding.

His custodian has! Seagoats share the goat family's common tendency to try anything and keep trying when all principles of edibility would advise spitting out and turning to greener pastures. Cloth, hair, stone, wood, metal; soft or hard or oozing or pointed or decoratively foamed; trash and treasure alike - down the gullet it goes.

 

There came a night when a fat little no-longer-wiggler raced around the upper levels of his hive for the first time, awed by his own wildness at climbing stairs with a mere two legs and two, get this, _arms_. A seagoat custodian lay at the hive entrance closest to the landbound lake they lived beside, so that he could listen to the exploratory sounds, proud. Eventually, he stretched his neck out and nosed through the hive for something to eat.

He browsed off towering stacks of zealotzines, chewed up a pair of trousers as a punishment for his little hooligan leaving them on the floor, and - in that fatal bovid assurance that rumination was the equal of any digestive problem - reached with a long tongue for slime slopped over the rim of the recuperacoon and left in footprints and splashes on the floor. It almost had an inviting colour, greener than seaweeds, which was an encouraging sign.

The hallucinations lasted half the night. This was long enough for the seagoat to fight, in order: two more pairs of trousers with glaring polka-dot eyes in the open wardrobe; the doorframe that winsomely, but rudely tried to drape a necklace over his neck; the entirety of his lake; possibly the sky. Details had blurred by the last battle. It could have been the stars in particular that caused all the trouble, every last teasing pinprick one of them, winking so...

Rumination turned into a complete expulsion; then realisation had dawned. That slime!

THAT. SLIME!!!

For two and a half wipes after that night, Gamzee got butted and dragged away from his recuperacoon. It was easy, especially with one doorframe being a lot wider after it had lost the fight - that made Gamzee easier to butt and nip all around the block. Being on land for a significant amount of time is no seagoat's favourite thing, but in this case, he at least knew that their quiet lake had no real threats that would come to his ward's hive, and if the frogspawn _did_ get ideas he'd hear the glop of their approach in plenty of time. It was safe to concentrate on getting Gamzee to fall asleep in a nice troll nest. Anywhere but in

that

slime!!!

And when he started thinking too much about the slime, the seagoat could usually stop foaming furiously around the mouth with a quick dip, too fast for Gamzee to get in the recuperacoon.

But after those two and a half wipes, his little hooligan took to sulky jumping-on. He used those new hands for clawing-at. He yelled about how "The nightmares aren't funny anymore, oh no, oh god ... and um, the other god too--" and then cried, and yelled through it.

In return the seagoat yelled about how "Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeehhglub," stern in the extreme.

But ... the scent of distress from his once-wiggler and the trembling of weakness, the growing listlessness... The seagoat tried for a while to reassure himself with the kid's accomplishments, how he stood taller nowadays and had such an admirable number of opposable thumbs! But the scent of distress lingered - thickened - and coated the hive, even the troll nest that should have been nice. Past victories could no longer make up for it.

In the end, it made the custodian's conviction relent. Only to take a different form! But relent, just a little.

The seagoat cut the latest argument short to half-stomp half-undulate down the shore and dive back into the lake, and for the first time in a long time, he was furious not to be in his ocean. If only he hadn't dived into the first tunnel in the wiggler caverns that tasted of salt, ignoring the _wrong_ earthy tastes that accompanied the saltiness. If only he'd turned back and searched again when he began to miss the vibration of waves beating against the walls! If he had searched for the ocean where he'd belonged, then he'd be able to find seaweed practically before he bothered to looked for it! Durable and flexible, it would have been perfect for his purposes. He would have killed eels or sharks or wrong-blooded trolls or crabs or turtles lurking in it - they would have been dead years ago already, to keep them from bothering Gamzee, but any new ones would be torn apart right now. He would have killed any of the seaweed itself that tried to entrap him! He would have dragged and torn the forest of it free from its roots! He would, this instant, since the kid was in such serious need... 

... he would make do with getting lily pads.

When Gamzee saw his custodian showing off the lily pads over his muzzle, he'd snorted with laughter and plastered some of the other leaves over his own face. His silly little hooligan was of the intuitive type, though, and when the seagoat moved onto the shore to nudge him closer to the recuperacoon, Gamzee's eyes went wide with understanding and relief. He tied the leaves over his mouth with string, waved at his custodian and his approving noises with eyes crinkled in one of his big smiles, and then he sank back into that slime for the rest of the night and the whole following day.

The process remained unnerving to the seagoat for a while - but Gamzee re-emerged in the faded glow of subsequent sunsets with his mouth protected, smelling contented and ready for breakfast. Sometimes the lily-pad masks drooped or shifted as Gamzee slept, or grew too dry to be effective, and the seagoat would snap at his heels to get him into the ablution trap or Gamzee would cannonball into the lake to wash all traces of the slime out of his mouth, but most of the time their plan worked. Eventually, a drone delivered a package containing a mouth-mask that didn't wither or move, and the seagoat licked his clever little hooligan until the paint came off his cheeks.

 

So Gamzee Makara avoided the hazards of sopor slime in much the same manner as many other young trolls did when they were learning which safeties and dangers were theirs. But, significantly: when the plastic mask was delivered, Gamzee had copied his custodian in scarfing down lily pads in celebration of no longer needing to do anything else with them.

Gamzee has followed the example of his lusus in many things, including a deep aversion to the idea of eating his bedding.

And he also holds the idea that this aversion should extend to absolutely nothing else.

CG: TC  
CG: ARE YOU EATING YOUR PANTS.  
CG: I DON'T KNOW WHAT COMPELS ME TO ASK WHEN THIS VISION AT ONCE CAME INTO EXISTENCE IN THE INNERMOST REACHES OF MY KNOWLEDGE, FILED UNDER "AN INEVITABILITY", AS SOON AS I GOT TO KNOW YOU WELL, AND I CAN ACTUALLY SEE THAT'S WHAT YOUR SLACK SLOBBERTRAP IS ENGAGED IN RIGHT NOW.  
CG: STOP EATING YOUR PANTS!!!!  
TC: BuT ThErE'S BeInG AlL MoRe oF My pAnTs tHaN My sHiRt?  
TC: aNd lIkE I Am aLl tO Be kNoWiNg iT'S BeSt iF I IcE ThEm fIrSt bUt fresh iS GoOd tOo  
CG: I AM SWITCHING OFF THIS WEBCAM, FOREVER, GOODBYE.


End file.
